Complete works of virgin.., p.291
Complete Works of Virginia Woolf, page 291
TENN.
It sometimes seems to me, Watts, that the toe is not the most important part of the human body.
WATTS [starting up and seizing his palette again]
There speaks the voice of the true artist! You are right, Alfred. You have recalled me from my momentary exaltation. You remind me that even if I have succeeded, humanly speaking, with the great toe, I have not solved the problem of the drapery. [He goes to the picture and takes a mahlstick.] That indeed is a profoundly difficult problem. For by my treatment of the drapery I wish to express two important but utterly contradictory ideas. In the first place I wish to convey to the onlooker the idea that Modesty is always veiled; in the second that Modesty is absolutely naked. For a long time I have pondered at a loss. At last I have attempted a solution. I am wrapping her in a fine white substance which has the appearance of a veil; but if you examine it closely it is seen to consist of innumerable stars. It is in short the Milky Way. You ask me why? I will tell you. For if you consult the mythology of the ancient Egyptians, you will find that the Milky Way was held to symbolise — let me see, what did it symbolise — [He opens his book.]
MRS. C.
Let me see. Time’s getting on. Now let me think.
What shall I want on the voyage?
MR. C.
Faith, hope and charity.
MRS. C.
Yes and the poems of Sir Henry Taylor; and plenty of camphor. And photographs to give to the sailors.
TENN.
And a dozen or two of port.
WATTS
Horror! Horror! I have been most cruelly deceived! Listen: [He reads.] “The Milky Way among the ancients was the universal token of fertility. It symbolised the spawn of fish, the innumerable progeny of the sea, and the fertility of the marriage bed.”
Horror! Oh Horror! I who have always lived for the Utmost for the Highest have made Modesty symbolise the fertility of fish!
MR. C.
My poor old friend. Fish. Fish. Fish.
CURTAIN
ACT II
The Needles, ELLEN TERRY and JOHN CRAIG are sitting in bathing dresses on the Needles.
JOHN
Well, here we are!
NELL
Oh, how lovely it is to sit on a rock in the middle of the sea!
JOHN
In the middle of the sea?
NELL
Yes, it’s a sea. Are you the young man who jumped over the lane on a red horse?
JOHN
I am. Are you the young woman who was picking primroses in the lane?
NELL
I am.
JOHN
[Lor’] what a lark!
NELL
Oh you mustn’t let Signor hear you say that — or if you do, please pronounce the final d.
JOHN
D — be damned! Who’s Signor?
NELL
Who’s Signor? Oh he’s the modern Titian.
JOHN
Titian?
NELL
Yes. Titian. Titian. Titian.
JOHN
Sneezing? I hope you haven’t caught cold!
NELL
No. I feel heavenly. As warm as a toast — sitting in the sun here. You can’t think how cold it is sitting for Modesty in a veil.
JOHN
Sitting for Modesty in a veil? What the dickens d’you mean?
NELL
Well, I’m married to a great artist. And if you’re married to a great artist, you do sit for Modesty in a veil.
JOHN
Married? You’re a married woman? You? Was that old gentleman with a white beard your husband?
NELL
Oh everybody’s got a white beard at Dimbola. But if you mean, am I married to the old gentleman with a white beard in the lane, yes, of course I am. Here’s my wedding ring. [She pulls it off.] With this ring I thee wed. With this body I thee worship. Aren’t you married too?
JOHN
I married? Why I’m only twenty-two. I’m a lieutenant in the Royal Navy. That’s my ship over there. Can’t you see it?
[NELL looks.]
NELL
That? That’s a real ship. That’s not the kind of ship that sinks with all we love below the verge.
JOHN
My dear girl. I don’t know what you’re talking about. Of course it’s a real ship. The Iron Duke. Thirty-two guns. Captain Andrew Hatch. My name’s Craig. Lieutenant John Craig of Her Majesty’s Navy.
NELL
And my name is Mrs. George Frederick Watts.
JOHN
But haven’t you got another?
NELL
Oh plenty! Sometimes I’m Modesty. Sometimes I’m Poetry. Sometimes I’m Chastity. Sometimes, generally before breakfast, I’m merely Nell.
JOHN
I like Nell best.
NELL
Well that’s unlucky, because today I’m Modesty. Modesty crouching at the feet of Mammon. Only Mammon’s great toe was out of drawing and so I got down; and then I heard a whistle. Dear me, I suppose I’m an abandoned wretch. Everybody says how proud I ought to be. Think of hanging in the Tate Gallery for ever and ever — what an honour for a young woman like me! Only — isn’t it awful — I like swimming.
JOHN
And sitting on a rock, Nell?
NELL
Well it’s better than that awful model’s throne. Mrs.
Cameron killed the turkey today. The Muse has to have wings, you see. But you can’t think how they tickle.
JOHN
What the dickens are you talking about? Who’s Mrs.
Cameron?
NELL
MRS. Cameron is the photographer; and MR. Cameron is the philosopher; and Mr. Tennyson is the poet; and Signor is the artist. And beauty is truth; truth beauty; that is all we know and all we ought to ask. Be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever. Oh, and the utmost for the highest, I was forgetting that.
JOHN
It’s worse than shooting the sun with a sextant. Is this the Isle of Wight? Or is it the Isle of Dogs — the Isle where the mad dogs go?
NELL
The apple trees bloom all the year here; the nightingales sing all the night.
JOHN
Look here, Nell. Let’s talk sense for a minute. Have you ever been in love?
NELL
In love? Aren’t I married?
JOHN
Oh but like this. [He kisses her.]
NELL
Not quite like that. [He kisses her again.] But I rather like it. Of course, it must be wrong.
JOHN
Wrong? [He kisses her.] What’s wrong about that?
NELL
It makes me think such dreadful thoughts. I don’t think I could really dare to tell you. You see, it makes me think of — beef steaks; beer; standing under an umbrella in the rain; waiting to go into a theatre; crowds of people; hot chestnuts; omnibuses — all the things I’ve always dreamt about. And then, Signor snores. And I get up and go to the casement. And the moon’s shining. And the bees on the thorn. And the dews on the lawn. And the nightingales forlorn.
JOHN
‘Struth! God bless my soul! I’ve been in the tropics, but I’ve seen nothing like this. Now look here, Nell. I’ve got something to say to you — something very sensible. I’m not the sort of man who makes up his mind in a hurry. I took a good look at you as I jumped over that lane. And I said to myself as I landed in the turnip field, that’s the girl for me. And I’m not the sort of man who does things in a hurry. Look here. [He takes out a watch.] Let’s be married at half past two.
NELL
Married? Where shall we live?
JOHN
In Bloomsbury.
NELL
Are there any apple trees there?
JOHN
Not one.
NELL
Any nightingales?
JOHN
Never heard a nightingale in Bloomsbury, on my honour as an officer.
NELL
What about painting? D’you ever paint?
JOHN
Only the bath. Red, white and blue. With Aspinalls enamel.
NELL
But what shall we live on?
JOHN
Well, bread and butter. Sausages and kippers.
NELL
No bees. No apple trees. No nightingales. Sausages and kippers. John, this is Heaven!
JOHN
That’s fixed then. Two thirty sharp.
NELL
Oh but what about this? [She takes her wedding ring off-]
JOHN
Did the old gentleman with a white beard really give you that?
NELL
Yes. It was dug out of a tomb. Beatrice’s. No, Laura’s! Lady Raven Mount Temple gave it him on the top of the Acropolis at dawn. It symbolises — let me see, what does this wedding ring symbolise? With this ring I thee wed; with this brush I thee worship — It symbolises Signor’s marriage to his art.
JOHN
He’s committed bigamy. I thought so! There’s something fishy about that old boy, I said to myself, as I jumped over the lane; and I’m not the sort of chap to make up his mind in a hurry.
NELL
Fishy? About Mr. Watts?
JOHN
Very fishy; yes.
[A loud sigh is heard.~
NELL [looking round]
I thought I heard somebody sighing.
JOHN [looking round]
I thought I saw somebody spying.
NELL
That’s only one of those dreadful reporters. The beach is always full of them. They hide behind the rocks, you know, in case the Poet Laureate may be listening to the scream of the maddened beach dragged backward by the waves. [The porpoise appears in the foreground.] Look. Look. What’s that?
JOHN
It looks to me like a porpoise.
NELL
A porpoise? A real porpoise?
JOHN
What else should a porpoise be?
NELL
Oh I don’t know. But as nightingales are widows, I thought the porpoise might be a widower. He sounds so sad. Listen. [The porpoise gulps.] Oh, poor porpoise, how sad you sound! I’m sure he’s hungry. Look how his mouth opens! Haven’t we anything we could give him?
JOHN
I don’t go about with my bathing drawers full of sprats.
NELL
And I’ve got nothing — or only a ring. There, porpoise — take that! [She throws him her wedding ring.]
JOHN
Lord, Nell! Now you’ve gone and done it! The porpoise has swallowed your wedding ring! What’ll Lady Mount Temple say to that?
NELL
Now you’re married to Mr. Watts, porpoise! The utmost for the highest, porpoise. Look upwards, porpoise! And keep perfectly still! I suppose it was a female porpoise, John?
JOHN
That don’t matter a damn to Mr. Watts, Nell. [He kisses her.]
CURTAIN
ACT III.
The studio as before, TENNYSON reading Maud aloud.
TENNYSON reads aloud for some time. Then the door opens and WATTS comes in, hiding his head in his hands. He staggers across the room distractedly.
TENN.
“The fault was mine, the fault was mine” —
Why am I sitting here so stunn’d and still, Plucking the harmless wild-flower on the Hill? —
It is this guilty hand! —
And there rises ever a passionate cry —
WATTS
Ellen! Ellen! My wife — my wife — dead, dead, dead!
TENN.
My God, Watts. You don’t mean to say Ellen’s dead?
MRS. C.
Drowned? That’s what comes of going bathing.
WATTS
She is dead — drowned — to me. I was behind a rock on the beach. I saw her — drown.
MR. C.
Happy Ellen! Gone to Paradise.
MRS. C.
Oh but this is awful! The girl’s dead and where am I to get another model for the Muse? Are you sure, Signor, that she’s quite dead? Not a spark of life left in her? Couldn’t something be done to revive her? Brandy — where’s the brandy?
WATTS
No brandy will bring Ellen to life. She is dead — stone dead — to me.
MR. C.
Happy Ellen; lucky Ellen. They don’t wear braces in Heaven; they don’t wear trousers in Heaven. Would that I were where Ellen lies.
TENN.
Yes. There is something highly pleasing about the death of a young woman in the pride of life. Rolled round in earth’s diurnal course with stocks and stones and trees. That’s Wordsworth. I’ve said it too. ’Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. Wearing the white flower of a blameless life. Hm, ha, yes let me see. Give me a pencil. Now a sheet of paper. Alexandrines? Iambics? Sapphics? Which shall it be?
[He begins to write, WATTS goes to his canvas and begins painting out the picture.]
WATTS
Modesty forsooth! Chastity! Alas, I painted better than I knew. The Ancient Egyptians were right. This veil did symbolise the fertility of fish. [He strikes his brush across it.] What symbol can I find now?
TENN.
Ahem. I have written the first six lines. Listen. Ode on the death of Ellen Terry, a beautiful young woman who was found drowned.
[Enter ELLEN. Everybody turns round in astonishment.]
MR. C.
But you’re in Heaven!
TENN.
Found drowned.
MRS. C.
Brandy’s no use!
NELL
Is this a madhouse?
MR. C.
Are you a fact?
NELL
I’m Ellen Terry.
WATTS [advancing brandishing his brush]
Yes Ma’am. There you speak the truth. You are no longer the wife of George Frederick Watts. I saw you —
NELL
Oh you did, did you?
WATTS
I was on the beach, behind a rock. And I saw you — yes, abandoned wretch, I saw you, sitting on the Needles; sitting on the Needles with a man; sitting on the Needles with your arms round a man. This is the end, Ellen. Our marriage is dissolved — in the sea.
TENN.
The unplumb’d, salt, estranging sea. Matthew Arnold.
NELL
I’m very sorry, Signor. Indeed I am. But he looked so very hungry, Signor; I couldn’t help it. She looked so very hungry, I should say; I’m almost sure it was a female.
WATTS
A female! Don’t attempt to lie to me, Ellen.
NELL
Well, John thought it was a female. And John ought to know. John’s in the Navy. He’s often eaten porpoises on desert islands. Fried in oil, you know, for breakfast.
WATTS
John has eaten porpoises fried in oil for breakfast. I thought as much. Go to your lover, girl; live on porpoises fried in oil on desert islands; but leave me — to my art. [He turns to his picture.]
NELL
Oh well, Signor, if you will take it like that — I was only trying to cheer you up. I’m very sorry, I’m sure, to have upset you all. But I can’t help it. I’m alive!
I never felt more alive in all my life. But I’m awfully sorry, I’m sure —
TENN.
Don’t apologise, Ellen. What does it matter? An immortal poem destroyed — that’s all. [He tears up his poem.]
NELL
But couldn’t you find a rhyme for porpoise, Mr.
Tennyson?
TENN.
Impossible.
NELL
Well then, what about Craig?
TENN.
Browning could find a rhyme for Craig.
MRS. C.
Ah, but in my art rhymes don’t matter. Only truth and the sun. Sit down again, Ellen. There — on that stool. Hide your head in your hands. Sob. Penitence on the stool of —
NELL [standing at bay]
No, I can’t, MRS. Cameron. No, I can’t. First I’m Modesty; then I’m the Muse. But Penitence on a Monument — no, that I will not be.
[A knock at the door]
MARY
The coffins have come, Ma’am. The coffins, I say. And you couldn’t find a nicer pair outside of Kensal Green. As I was saying to his lordship just now, it do seem a pity to take them all the way to India. Why can’t you plant ’em here with a weeping angel on top?
